On August 8, 2023 Poseida Therapeutics, Inc. (Nasdaq: PSTX), a clinical-stage cell and gene therapy company advancing a new class of treatments for patients with cancer and rare diseases, reported financial results for the second quarter ended June 30, 2023 (Press release, Poseida Therapeutics, AUG 8, 2023, View Source [SID1234634013]).

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"In the second quarter, we continued to make strong progress while sharpening our focus on our clinical pipeline and research efforts," said Mark Gergen, Chief Executive Officer of the Company. "As announced yesterday, we received a strategic investment from Astellas, which is comprised of the purchase of 8,333,333 shares of common stock at $3.00 per share for an aggregate purchase price of $25 million and an additional $25 million one-time payment for certain strategic rights. This support from yet another premier biopharma strengthens our financial position and further validates our proprietary technologies and cell therapy approach. As we advance our clinical-stage allogeneic CAR-T portfolio, we continue to make improvements based upon learnings across our programs and look forward to providing data updates at a medical meeting later this year. In our gene therapy portfolio, we continued to validate our science, as highlighted by multiple presentations at the American Society of Gene & Cell Therapy annual meeting in May. In addition, we are excited by the return of our promising Hemophilia A and PKU gene therapy programs from Takeda. We are in the process of evaluating which gene therapy programs we may advance on our own or seek to re-partner, and we look forward to providing an update in due course."

Financial Results for the Second Quarter 2023

Revenues
Revenues were $20.0 million for the second quarter ended June 30, 2023, and $30.4 million for the six months ended June 30, 2023 compared to $2.7 million and $4.1 million for the same periods in 2022. The increase was due to revenues earned from the collaboration and license agreement with Roche, which became effective in the third quarter of 2022 and $8.9 million of previously deferred revenue recognized as a result of the previously announced termination of our collaboration agreement with Takeda in the second quarter of 2023.

Research and Development Expenses
Research and development expenses were $39.2 million for the three months ended June 30, 2023, compared to $35.0 million for the same period in 2022. The increase was primarily due to an increase in personnel expenses as a result of increased headcount, an increase in preclinical stage programs and other unallocated expenses due to an increase in research collaboration activity, and an increase in facilities expense, offset by a decrease in clinical stage programs, primarily driven by the wind-down of clinical development activities associated with autologous programs and related contract termination expense in the prior year and the transition of manufacturing to the Company’s internal pilot plant for P-BCMA-ALLO1.

For the six months ended June 30, 2023, research and development expenses were $77.2 million, compared to $83.9 million for the same period in 2022. The decrease was primarily due to a decrease in external costs related to clinical stage programs primarily driven by the wind-down of clinical development activities associated with autologous programs and related contract termination expense in the prior year and the transition of manufacturing to the Company’s internal pilot plant for P-BCMA-ALLO1, partially offset by an increase in external costs related to preclinical stage programs and other unallocated expenses due to an increase in research collaboration activity, an increase in personnel expenses as a result of increased headcount and an increase in facilities expense related to an additional lease entered into in March 2022 to support headcount growth.

General and Administrative Expenses
General and administrative expenses for the three months ended June 30, 2023 were $8.7 million compared to $9.2 million for the same period in 2022. The decrease was primarily due to lower headcount and facility costs.

For the six months ended June 30, 2023 and 2022, general and administrative expenses were $20.5 million and $18.8 million, respectively. The increase was primarily due to an accelerated stock-based compensation expense in the first quarter of 2023 related to a one-time modification associated with the retirement of the Company’s former Executive Chairman.

Net Loss
Net loss was $27.5 million and $66.3 million for the three and six months ended June 30, 2023, respectively, compared to net loss of $43.0 million and $101.1 million for the three and six months ended June 30, 2022, respectively.

Cash Position
As of June 30, 2023, the Company’s cash, cash equivalents and short-term investments balance was $214.6 million. The Company expects that its cash, cash equivalents and short-term investments together with the remaining near-term milestones and other payments from Roche as well as the proceeds from the Astellas strategic investment will be sufficient to fund operations into early 2025.